Hands of Fire
by rosaxx50
Summary: Written for SMACKDOWN 2011. There are many things that separate Daja  Kisubo from her siblings, and many things that do not.
1. I

The taste of copper is heavy on her tongue, and its scent floods her mind. It rings as though it's being pounded into exquisite shape.

"Daja!"

Sandry's hand is suddenly on her shoulder.

Daja blinks. "Don't you hear that?"

Sandry's brows pull together into a frown. "Hear what?"

Daja looks around, searching for support, but Tris merely reclines further into the thatched roof, dreamy and distant. Thief-boy, on the other hand, does pay attention; he gives her a look that suggests, plainly, that she's insane.

None of them heard it.

Oh.

Right.

She remembers now. She has magic. Maybe she only learnt about it a few days ago, but she does have magic. And now, yes, Daja recognizes the call for what it is; Mother had once nearly had hysterics, when she almost fell off the ship for no apparent reason, because they hadn't known the siren call of the beautifully worked steel that had fallen overboard.

"You nearly walked off the roof," Briar says.

Daja believes that.


	2. II

Moving overland is very different from sailing.

It's traveling. They're similar to that extent. But the dangerous plodding of horses is not the same as the gentle swaying of the boat, rocked by the sea; each footstep is awkward, and her motion is best described as bouncing.

Sandry and Briar, one who has a great deal more experience, the other much too quick on his feet, are doing much better. They don't look as though they're dreading the rest of the journey to Gold Ridge.

Daja does not want to wake up the next morning.

So she avoids the two of them, as well as she can, when they're connected mind-to-mind, and it's Tris she rides beside. Tris is red-faced with effort, the way Daja knows she would be if she weren't blessed with the dark skin of her lineage.

They share their awkwardness, and her brother-by-blood was right; sharing it isn't so bad.


	3. III

Sandry thinks Daja's hands are beautiful. She's said so, several times. The way they glimmer in the lamplight, or in the glow from her stone...

Tris thinks about them like scars, because she's got a collection of them of her own - though they cannot be seen. They all do. But that's not how Daja thinks about it, either.

Daja cannot help but remember that her Living Metal came from the unmarked copper of her Trader's staff, and was witness to the second-worst period of her life. (She cannot call it the 'worst' when her parents died weeks before she received the staff.) But the staff was also witness to some of her best.

Briar probably understands it the best. He's got his X tattoos and isn't proud of them, but they're part of who he is, and what he once did.


	4. IV

Daja's thoughts have been blurry for the past few days. It's dangerous, when she's working on boxes that must hold in the deadly Blue Pox, but she has only an hour or so each day (counting meals) to take a break.

Her life has been reduced, she sometimes moans in the back of her mind, to sleep and work. Every morning, she wakes up in the forge, has breakfast, works on the boxes, has lunch, works on the boxes, has dinner, works, and then sleeps. She rarely visits Discipline; when she does, she sees almost no one. Daja doesn't actually articulate this. She thinks this:

...She is saving lives and she isn't making mistakes and...

She should be too tired to miss her siblings, but she does. She wants to see Sandry's smile, because when she laughs and chatters, everyone in the room pays attention. She wants to match wits with Briar, because his mind is fluid and so is his tongue. She wants to enjoy the small, quiet, and oh-so-precious things with Tris, who can spend hours in one place, a calm presence against Daja's movement.

She wants, she wants, and she can't have it all. Daja tells herself that their presence (while she's awake enough to notice it) will be her reward, and works on.


	5. V

She is not a proud person.

She doesn't do the human equivalent of baring her teeth and growling when her rank is ignored, like Sandry does; she isn't as set in her ways as Tris can sometimes be; she doesn't gloat over her special skills, like Briar does about his ability to pick locks.

Nevertheless, the day she receives her medallion is one she remembers with, yes, pride.

Because Frostpine grinned at her, crafty old man that he sometimes is, and said, "Now you can start teaching someone else to make nails." (If that isn't an achievement after all those hours of labor, Daja doesn't know what is.)

And Sandry looked at her with shining admiration, Tris with shocked pleasure, and Briar with shared excitement, the way she knows she eyed them and their achievements in return.

The medallion hanging around her neck embodies such an amazing day; how could she feel any less than pride?


	6. VI

Daja is discovering that she loves snow. Frostpine just grumbles and tries to burrow further into their furs (Daja takes pity on him and warms them up with her powers) but Daja doesn't stay inside. She leaves their tent and lets snowflakes drop into her cupped hands, watching them turn into water.

It's magical. It doesn't snow in Emelan; maybe in the mountains around Gold Ridge, but Daja's only been there once.

Gold Ridge.

Drawing fire into herself with the help of her-

There she goes again. She promised herself she would stop thinking about her siblings, because once she starts she cannot stop, and she imagines:

Sandry scooping snow with absolute glee, ducking and dodging as Briar aims snowballs at everyone; they fire back and forth, and at everyone in between, until Tris is fed up enough her braids and eyes are sparkling lightning. She stands up, and the snow rises with her, wind whipping about until she looks like she's at the center of a snowstorm; a gesture, and it collapses on the other three, who have been too preoccupied by laughing...

But when she opens her eyes, she's standing alone, and her feet are burning a hole in the layer of snow. Two weeks. Only two weeks of traveling, and she's already missing home.


	7. VII

Of all things she might have expected to reunite herself and her siblings, a miffed suitor of Sandry wasn't it.

But oh, they are united in their fury.

Daja wants to go and find him, and pummel him with her staff. It's not for show; one of her main hobbies is training with it. But she's by far the most cool-headed, because, conversely, learning the art of fighting makes her less likely to do so.

Fortunately, after only a little arguing, her siblings agree. So maybe Tris is finding it difficult to contain her migraine, at the thought of Sandry being trapped, and Briar wants to go find his knives, but they soon remember revenge is a dish best served cold. They go and find the Empress.

Together.

One good thing, Daja thinks, ironically, came out of that very foolish man's attempt to separate Sandry from her siblings: the exact opposite outcome of what he'd intended.


End file.
